Year of the Snake
by dreaming of my dark angel
Summary: The Sorting of Lord Voldemort/Tom Riddle. R/R please :


The sorting of Lord Voldemort.

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**Year of the Snake**

"Riddle, Tom."

**When one is born, one is a ****pink, weak, mewling thing. But soon, we learn that weakness is not tolerated in life –it is simply unacceptable. And so we hide our flaws with such determination, such single minded resolve, that eventually, even we forget that they are there.**

A young boy strode towards the stool with unconscious grace; he lacked the trembling, twitching and nervous airs of the other first years.

**They say it is the weak that are cruel. ****Biting words, cold smiles, mocking glances –all manifestations of a mind made fragile through a harsh and bitter reality.**

As he gingerly picked up the sorting hat between his thumb and fore finger, Tom allowed himself a brief disdainful sneer at its pitiful condition before once again schooling his features into a careful mask of indifference.

**When we shape the future, the power that we hold in our hands is both great and terrible.**** The radiance of change is blinding; it burns our eyes until tears slip down our cheeks, a fiery trail to light the way.**

The hat slipped past his eyes and he scowled internally, wondering what would happen next.

**Beauty is a cruel delight, brief and fleeting as the first blooms of spring. It dances before our eyes, lithe, lovely, exquisite, before disappearing again as the sands of time shift. Then, we are left with nothing more than memories that trap us with their splendor, coiling around us like thorns, eager to draw blood from wounds of the past.**

Suddenly a low voice murmured in his ear, "What have we here?"

**The best kiss in the world is really a bite in disguise. Passion is when**** the kissee screams in pleasure as teeth sink in to the flesh, again and again. Swollen lips and bruised skin are a token of love, a way of saying, "You are mine." So pain and love are really much the same.**

Tom tensed slightly and fought the urge to flinch away. The intimacy of a voice by his ear, the intrusion of his mind –it all revolted him.

**A pleasure beyond all others, pain is glorious in its agony.**

"You're an odd one, aren't you? Talented. _Very_ talented –but you have much buried pain… Gryffindor perhaps? There are those who could help you heal in that house."

**Hope, desire, hunger –ambition is known by many names, though it is nothing more than a waking dream. A conscious yearning for something we've yet to hold. We envision it in our mind, ****drinking in the life that could be ours, might be ours, until it becomes not a want, but a need.**

"No," thought Tom venomously, "I don't need help. I don't want help. There is only power in pain when others believe they can inflict it. I need no one by my side in order to succeed."

**Imagination is a powerful thing****. With it, you can create a refuge, a sanctuary, a haven that none may enter. With imagination, you can escape.**

The silence following these thoughts lasted so long that Tom began to wonder if he had imagined the voice the first time.

**What is reality? Why do we hold so dear to our hearts when it seems to be nothing more than cold, grey buildings and happily ever afters that never last? There must be something more.**

"Don't fret; I am real, or as real as can be." The hat paused, "This is against my better judgment young one, but if you are so stubbornly opposed to Gryffindor, I supposed it must be... SLYTHERIN!"

**According to lore and legend****, those who serve Satan are granted eternal life, but with a price: as they wander this world in their immortality, they keep a little bit of Hell within them. Yet, those mortals of pure heart who aren't led astray, age and die, and if that is not Hell, pray tell, what is?**

The boy quickly removed the hat, relieved to have recovered his sense of sight, but not before the sorting hat whispered one last ruling, "Beware Tom Riddle, I can see all that is in your heart and I feel compelled to warn you: Life is full of contrast. There can be no light without shadows. There can be no happiness without grief. And there can be no love without pain."

**Death is a slave to fate, chance, Kings and desperate men.**

Tom ignored the hat and moved towards the cheering Slytherin table, smiling like a king greeting subjects.

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**REVIEWS MAKE ME SMILE**


End file.
